Definitions for ice age

This page provides all possible meanings and translations of the word ice age

Princeton's WordNetRate this definition:(0.00 / 0 votes)

ice age, glacial period, glacial epoch(noun)

any period of time during which glaciers covered a large part of the earth's surface

"the most recent ice age was during the Pleistocene"

WiktionaryRate this definition:(0.00 / 0 votes)

ice age(Noun)

Any of several cold periods in the history of the earth marked by episodes of extensive glaciation alternating with episodes of relative warmth.

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Ice age

An ice age, or more precisely, a glacial age, is a period of long-term reduction in the temperature of the Earth's surface and atmosphere, resulting in the presence or expansion of continental ice sheets, polar ice sheets and alpine glaciers. Within a long-term ice age, individual pulses of cold climate are termed "glacial periods", and intermittent warm periods are called "interglacials". Glaciologically, ice age implies the presence of extensive ice sheets in the northern and southern hemispheres. By this definition, we are still in the ice age that began 2.6 million years ago at the start of the Pleistocene epoch, because the Greenland, Arctic, and Antarctic ice sheets still exist.